It's a Numbers Game
by littleredkels
Summary: For the first few days he counted everything. How many steps it took up the stairs. How many rings of his phone before it rolled to voice mail. How many times his mother called to make sure it was okay. How many times he looked over to John's side of the bed and immediately wanted to crawl in a hole and die. He counted everything. Major character death.


**I write the most depressing things. Why? Why do I do this to myself? SOB. This was done as a prompt given to me from my roleplay. I wrote it a while back and am just now getting around to posting it.  
As always, reviews and kudos are very much appreciated and such.  
Also, I own nothing. Sad truth, I know.**

* * *

It was loud. And hot. Really hot. Hot enough to have him sweating despite the shaking of his body. And why was he shaking, anyway? Why did his head hurt? And his arm. His legs. His back. Everything hurt. Why was he hurting so bad?

And then he heard it. A clear sound over the rest of the static noise around him. A car horn. Blaring one continual blast. Who the fuck was honking at him? But it was a familiar sound. The horn of John's old Mustang.

It was as he blearily opened hazel eyes that it all came rushing back to him.

_"You're gonna get a ticket for this shit." Punk chuckled, arm hanging out of the window of the car. John merely laughed, "I do this all the time back here on this road. Ain't nooobody here to pull me over."_

_The younger man merely shook his head, smiling in spite of himself, "At any rate, maybe we could take it down a notch. 130 seems a little high for my tastes."_

_"Aw, babe. Are you scared? Here, you can hold my hand." Just as John took his hand off the wheel, Punk realized it. His lover turned his head to look at him and he saw the steering wheel turn. Just a bit. Just enough to throw them off course. At one hundred and thirty miles an hour._

"John…" His voice was scratchy, thick from smoke. Fuck, the car was on fire. He coughed now, hacking loudly as he somehow managed out of his seatbelt and out the completely shattered windshield. No John in the driver's seat. Then where was he? "John!"

It was sheer panic. Maybe he'd gotten out of the car already. Hadn't passed out and was calling 911. The sirens off in the distance said someone had. Then again. That could have been one of the many cars now stopped on the side of the road. One man stepped forward, trying to help him as he staggered to his feet but Punk shoved him off with a surprising amount of strength. Adrenaline was a funny thing.

"Sir, you should really stay still until the paramedics—"

"My fiance. Where— Where is my fiance?"

The people around him tried to keep neutral faces, but that didn't stop every single one of them from turning their glances towards the ditch off the side of the road. A good 20 yards away at least.

His heart plummeted to his stomach. "No…" Arms were holding him and he clawed his way out of them. "No…! No, no, no, no! John!" He ran, stumbling and rolling his way down into the ditch, which probably did him a favor. Had he still been standing, what he saw would have brought him to his knees. Would have brought any man to his knees.

"Baby, no…!" The tears were instant as he crawled over to his fiance's body, trembling head to toe as he rolled him over, pulling John's bulky form up into his lap. There was blood trailing from his mouth, a shard of glass that had to have been larger than John's own hand lodged into the left side of his chest and a large gash gushing out blood from his forehead. "John…?"

What he got was a guttural sort of groan, forcing the body in his arms to cough up blood, splattering on Punk's shirt.

"No… N-no, no. John… Baby it's me. I-It's Phil… Please… Ohmygod… HELP! Someone help!" Punk turned over his shoulder, screaming at the top of his lungs before focusing all of his attention back to his lover.

"God please… John… Open your eyes…"

He got his wish, but what he saw was quite possibly even worse. Those blue eyes, once bright and full of life, love and happiness now held… Nothing. They were dull, glazed over and unable to focus. "Fuck… B-baby… Can you hear me…?" Punk had now taken to pushing his hand over the gash in his forehead, not bothered by the blood and simply trying to get it to stop bleeding. "T-tell me you can here me, John… Please…!" The last word was nothing more than a choked sob.

It was the wheezing breath that set a flame of hope in his heart. One that was extinguished as soon as the man opened his mouth, his voice thick with blood, almost unrecognizable. "I love you… So much…"

"Don't say that! John don't—"

"Listen to me…" Another pained cough and more blood sent dribbling from his lips, causing Punk to actually close his eyes and look away with shaking sobs. "You'll be okay…"

"No. _You_ will be okay. You hear me? You're gonna be okay. Th-there's ambulances on the way and—"

"Phil…"

The name made him freeze, dead on the spot. "Please no…" He breathed out the words, now beginning to rock the limp form in his arms. "Don't… Please don't… I need you… You can't— Y-you c-can't—" There was no way he could say it. Not a damn chance.

And John _smiled_. The fucking bastard gave him the weakest smile he'd seen to date, but he still managed it, "Said I love you, Punk..."

"Phil… It's Phil right now… P-please…Fuck!" Punk could hear the rattling in his breath and he squeezed out a groan of his own pain. But not physical. He couldn't feel a damn thing that was wrong with him at the moment. It was the pain of what he was seeing. What he knew he'd be seeing in a matter of seconds. What he had never prepared himself. What he never _could_ prepare himself for.

"Still said I love you, Phillip..." John wheezed.

He clenched his jaw, forcing his eyes closed for just a moment before opening them again to look down at his face, barely even able to breathe out the words in reply. "I love you too, John… So much… So fucking much… Please don't do this… Don't leave me here…"

"I'm clockin' out, here, boss…"

The sob that Punk gave now was a laughing one, choking on his own air as he bent down over his body and simply wept, squeezing him tightly in his arms as he managed out, "Not an option…"

John gave a chuckle that nearly tore the younger man's heart out of his chest, "M'sorry, Phil… I lo—" He coughed again, violently this time, his entire body nearly seizing up in Punk's arms and the tattooed man pulled back to press their foreheads together, his own tears falling on John's dirty face.

"Don't... Please don't go…Don't do this to me…"

"Loveyou,Punker…" With this, his chest started heaving breath, but it only came in shallow bouts, barely allowing him air.

"I love you too, Johnboy… Wait for me, okay…? P-please…"

He heard it. The last breath his lover ever took. Heard the intake of air before his body gave up on him. Felt his heart stop beating. He could _feel_ the life leave the body in his arms and he felt sick. Felt dead inside. With one ragged breath in he let out a howling scream -an ear splitting, tear your heart out, 'Let me go with him' _SCREAM_- just before collapsing back onto his lover's chest, sobbing openly and doing nothing more but rocking John's body in his arms, babbling nonsense to himself. Trying to undo their drive out of sheer will.

The paramedics arrived and it took four of them to pry Punk, screaming and kicking and biting and cursing, from John's body. Took a sedative to get him into a separate ambulance.

It took Amy three hours to get him out of the house for visitation. His own mother five to drag him to the funeral. And collectively his entire family, and John's, to haul him up off of the ground after they'd lowered the casket.

It took a full three weeks for him to respond with anything more than "yes" or "no". A month and a half for him to make eye contact with anyone. Another two months before he could hear John's name without having to excuse himself. It was four months before anyone trust him to be home alone and 6 before his smiles managed to reach his eyes again. Three anniversaries before he could visit the grave without going back into a catatonic state for days afterwards.

But he never got over it. He never had a night that he didn't see John's face when he closed his eyes. There was never a moment when he wouldn't at least attempt to turn over his shoulder to tell his lover something only to find him not there. He never found anyone else, despite the few dates he was set up on. He never tried.

They weren't John.

No one would ever be John.

Now, around his neck, hanging over the top of his suit at his Hall of Fame induction, he wore a set of dog tags with two rings hanging from the chain.

"I kept going because I knew he would want me to," His voice quivered slightly and he took a deep breath. "And it's been seven years, but I think… I think I know what he'd say. Think he'd be up here with that same goofy smile he always had and he'd…" Punk had to stop, had to close his eyes and look away, leaning heavily on the podium and taking a few moments to compose himself. "Think he'd want to say thank you for everything. For the support. For the hatred… And then he'd go on some rant about how he's not a hero. But he was… He is…" Pausing again, he lifted the tags to his lips, kissing each one of them, his ring and then John's own, holding the cool metal to his lips and letting a few tears fall down his cheeks before lifting the ring up towards the ceiling, finding it a bit hard to breathe.

"So here's to you, Johnboy."

He recounted the story to the headstone, his fingers running over the smooth granite, tracing the familiar name. "I miss you, John… Everyday… We all do, but…" Punk shook his head, taking a moment to find his voice before it cracked. "I changed my name today. I finally did it. I just feel like Phillip Jack Brooks-Cena has such a nice ring to it…" With his lip quivering he lifted a hand to his mouth and kissed it before reaching back down to deliver the kiss to the cold stone. Hauling himself up, he let out a trembling sigh and nodded to himself, brushing off the pants of his suit and heading back to the car waiting for him.

"Have a good chat?" John's mother asked him quietly.

He scooted into the backseat, immediately leaning on his love's brother, Matt, without a word, shoulders shaking silently.

It took him three days to come back out of their house after that particular visit, but when he did, he had a flat black tungsten ring wrapped around his left ring finger and an ornate white gold band around his thumb. They never left his hand. He wouldn't let them. He may have never married John, but he might as well have. He was the only man that would ever hold CM Punk's heart.


End file.
